Public offers suggestions on use of Fall River's vacant Henry Lord school building

Tuesday

Aug 6, 2013 at 12:01 AMAug 6, 2013 at 6:04 AM

In a meeting meant to source ideas for the future use of the now-vacant Henry Lord Middle School building on Amity Street, few showed up.

In fact, the audience was made up of only two other School Committee members and the local media.

Michael Gagne

In a meeting meant to source ideas for the future use of the now-vacant Henry Lord Middle School building on Amity Street, few showed up.

In fact, the audience was made up of only two other School Committee members and the local media.

From a table in the library of the Henry Lord Middle School on Monday night, Uses of Henry Lord subcommittee member Joseph Martins read a list containing 12 previously emailed recommendations he had received, many of them from parents.

Recommendations included a proposal that the school department lease the building to Atlantis Charter School, as it is looking to “consolidate the upper and lower schools,” according to an email Martins read.

In another email, a resident suggested that the school could be converted into public housing apartments.

The Fall River Educators Association weighed in, suggesting that the Resiliency Preparatory High School relocate to Henry Lord and expand its program to also serve seventh- and eighth-grade students.

“The students at Resiliency Preparatory School have been shuttled between one old, inefficient building after another in recent years,” read a letter from FREA President Rebecca Cusick.

Cusick also suggested that the building could serve students at the Stone Therapeutic Middle Day School.

Parents recommended opening the school as a preschool-to-grade 8 school, according to Rick Pavao, chairman of the subcommittee.

There is still the option of reopening Henry Lord as it was before, a middle school. However, because it the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education had planned to designate Henry Lord as a Level 5 — a chronically failing school — it would have to be run by an outside education management company, at an extra cost to the district.

Yet another recommendation had not been written down, Pavao siad, and that was to utilize the space as a pre-kindergarten facility.
Once decided upon, implementing a plan for Henry Lord may prove a challenge.

“One of the problems I see is the time element,” said Gabe Andrade, a School Committee and subcommittee member.

Andrade said he was concerned that there wouldn’t be enough time to implement a plan for the Henry Lord building in time for the start of school in September. He said he was also concerned about the remaining middle schools being over-populated.

School Committee member Robert Maynard commented afterwards that he still felt the best option for the building would have been the Fall River Innovation Academy, which the School Committee rejected as a whole last month.

“I’ve spoken to a lot of people,” Maynard said. “And they couldn’t believe it. A lot of parents are thinking that it was a wonderful thing we lost out on.”

Mayor Will Flanagan weighed in via a phone call later Monday evening, saying he would like to see the city’s preschool program possibly expanded at Henry Lord.

“Preschool is very important to child’s education,” Flanagan said. “Parents in this city rely on preschool in order to gain employment. I hear from parents directly regarding the cost of preschool. This might be an opportunity to expand.”

However, if approved, such a program might not be ready until 2014. “For preschool you’ll probably have to retrofit the building, some minor configuration of the building, so maybe in January you would start enrolling preschool students,” Flanagan said.

For now, all options are available.

“The plan of the subcommittee is to take as many plans as possible and forward it to the School Committee,” said Pavao, after the suggestions were read. He added that the committee will be open to suggested uses “right up until that meeting.”

He encouraged those with recommendations to call the school department at 508-675-8420, Ext. 435.

So far, the school department website lists a School Committee meeting tentatively set for Aug. 12, although it does not list a time or location. Subcommittee members have also suggested a meeting may take place on Aug. 21.